Sunday, March 14, 2010

Ferndale House, Mt Albert

The Mt Albert Historical Society had a function yesterday at Ferndale House, on New North Road in Mt Albert. I went along for a listen to the guest speaker (who talked about Sarah Elizabeth Jackson), and to look at the house.

Ferndale was built by the Garlick family, in two stages -- a small cottage in the 1860s, ("Fern Villa") and the enlarged version seen today in 1881. It was transferred to Mt Albert Borough Council after Mrs Garlick's death in 1947, and is used today for community meetings, private functions, with an early childhood centre at the rear.

Some of the interior features:

The house is also home to the Mt Albert Jubilee Wall Panels, designed by Joyce Ross and presented to Mt Albert City Council (all now part of Auckland City) in 1987. The embroidery and assembly were by a team of people: Valerie Candy, Faith Donovan, Diane Faull, Beth Jenner, Alice Hetherington, Noeleen Kealey, Veda McKay, Eileen Marsden, Ivy Marshall, Betty Rehn, Graham Ross, Joyce Ross, Margaret Woods, and Les Rehnm, over a total of 519 hours.

The first panel features Wairaka, one of those credited as the origin of the name Owairaka, the mountain after which the suburb is named.

The second panel shows the crest of Mt Albert City Council, absorbed into Auckland City in 1989 (just two years after this work was completed.)

The third shows, (from the bottom): Ferndale House, Mt Albert War Memorial Hall, Alberton, and the former DSIR building.

And I also finally found a photo on one of the walls of the house which I was looking for back when I was putting together Wairaka's Waters: the pumphouse on the Asylum grounds which supplied water for Mt Albert until 1922.

If you get a chance to come by Mt Albert and see Ferndale House, I'd recommend it.

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